Fragmented
by rhead-a-holyc
Summary: AU. Severus survived the war, but he didn't survive unscathed. Mentions of violence, I guess.


Nothing was real.

Or at least that was how it always felt now that everything was mixed and jumbled into an unruly mess that it had never been before.

Every experience and action seemed like it was someone else's, his body only a body, with an exterior source controlling it as everything filtered through his mind like a handful of water he was trying to hang on to despite the futility of it. The sights, smells, and sounds were all muted, feeling like they were so far away that he would never be able to reach them. Everything was just a faint mist that was both there and not.

Sometimes he wondered if everything was false and he had actually died when Voldemort had tried to kill him, and he simply hadn't noticed. It was a possibility that he was actually a ghost, except there were occasionally times when he felt the stinging ache of physical pain: the only thing that cut clearly through his mind. It was the only thing he could feel, the only thing that anchored him to being human, and so he sought it with the desperation of a man dying from thirst.

The breeze he had once enjoyed with Lily as they walked along the lake as children no longer held the same emotions as he remembered them to have only two years ago. There was no fondness in that memory, only apathy along with the knowledge of the events that would unfold days afterwards with all the anger and destruction of a tsunami.

He didn't know what was wrong with him. He _should _be able to figure it out with his occlumency, and he had tried traversing through his mind, but everything was just… blank, as if there was no longer a purpose and all the colours had been sucked out.

He was disconnecting, more and more from the world around him, with every unsuspecting second that passed by.

Nothing made sense anymore.

Nothing mattered anymore.

Not even the latest potion that had been invented a mere three days ago. He would usually be frantically trying to recreate and improve the potion for the simple reason of wanting to do it, and having the necessary ability to accomplish it.

He _had_ tried, but he had only stepped into his potions lab and spread the ingredients and equipment all around him mechanically, only to stare at it blankly without even a thought of start filtering through his foggy mind.

The music of instructions, loopholes, and alternate possibilities that were his inner thoughts had been silenced, perhaps permanently, and he couldn't find it within himself to care enough to try and fix it.

No one else cared, after all. There was no one for him to try and break out of this for. Lily had been the only one to do that when he was in one of his moods when they were still children but Lily was gone because of his own childishness and lack of judgement.

He was _alone_, and that no longer meant anything to him.

The memory of Lily's green eyes and red hair, the personality he had tried so hard to win over, from friend to romantic interest and possibly more, seemed like only a hazy dream that he may have had as a child. The frustration and annoyance that looking at any of the Potters had once caused to rise within him no longer existed, or if it did was too weak to even be acknowledged.

It was all just a dream his mind had made up to play with him like he was just some insignificant toy in a game, just a drop of water in a sea with no true power or purpose but to go with the flow with no real care for the consequence as long as it meant he was not stagnant and rotting, but he his mind _was_ beginning to stink like that stagnant water he didn't want to be.

The power he one held had disappeared with his concern and sense of responsibility. He could no longer consider himself a Slytherin, he currently lacked the ambition and cunning that the house prided itself in, and that didn't even ignite the smallest piece of anger within him. The common rooms and chambers that was his first home with the glinting green light from the Black Lake shining in was also the place he had first held true power over other people, memories he had once cherished.

All of them were meaningless now as they remained painted in barely distinguishable shades of grey.

Everything he had worked so hard for all his life was pointless if it meant that he couldn't enjoy it, and he wasn't. He could barely be bothered to even look at everything he had achieved. He had left Hogwarts, his only home, without a parting glance as if it meant nothing to him.

The anger he had held against his father, the disappointment in his mother, the hatred of the Marauders and their constant attacks and bullying, everything.

That wasn't him anymore. It didn't _feel _like it was, or at least it wasn't the fragment that was now his dominant mind. He was bits and pieces of a long destroyed puzzle, the entire picture lost to time, and the colours destroyed, slowly muting into a faded white that showed no indication of what once was.

That person who had achieved everything he had always wanted, and _felt,_ was long gone. It was someone else, someone he no longer knew. Perhaps even someone he never did and never wanted to again. They were so different, too different to ever enjoy each other's company.

What _was_ the point in this? In everything? In life? In continuing everything he had always done?

What was the point living in an ever greying world where every action was just as pointless as the one before, and the one prior to that? It was all simply a never-ending ebb and flow of nonsensical actions and desires that didn't _matter_ in the grand scheme of things, except no one quite realised it. No one realised the utter futility of their actions in the heat of the moment. It was not until that fire was put out could the consequences be seen.

He knew that he should _probably _get help, because he hadn't always been like this. Things had mattered once, he had cared once, which mean that what he was feeling now was inherently _wrong_, and should, somehow, be fixed.

Things didn't matter now, though, so getting help didn't matter either. He didn't need to be fixed, and he no longer wanted to.

It wasn't like anyone else would notice anyway.

**AN: Written for Triwizard Tournament: The Riddle Race**

**Written for DemiGod Wizard Duels (water) – Round 1: Write about a character similar to your representative character [exactly 1,123 words, music, breeze]**


End file.
